Read Online Hopscotch: A Novel (Pantheon Modern Writers Series) by Julio Cortázar - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Julio Cortázar
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Satchmo, Ronald, and Babs, “So what’s the use if you’re gonna cut off my juice,” and then the trumpet’sflaming up, the yellow phallus breaking the air and having fun, coming forward and drawing back and towards the end three ascending notes, pure hypnotic gold, a perfect pause where all the swing of the world was beating in an intolerable instant, and then the supersharp ejaculation slipping and falling like a rocket in the sexual night, Ronald’s hand caressing Babs’s neck and the scratching of the needle while the record kept on turning and the silence there was in all true music slowly unstuck itself from the walls, slithered out from underneath the couch, and opened up like lips or like cocoons.
“Ça alors,”
said Étienne.
“Yes, Armstrong’s great period,” said Ronald, examining the pile of records Babs had picked out. “Like Picasso’s giant period, if you like. Nowadays they’re both a pair of pigs. To think that doctors have invented ways to be rejuvenated … They’ll go on screwing us for another twenty years, wait and see.”
“Not us,” Étienne said. “We’ve already shot them down and just at the right moment, and all I ask is for someone to do the same for me when my time is up.”
“Just at the right moment? You’re not asking for much, kiddo,” said Oliveira, yawning. “But you’re right, we have given them the
coup de grâce
already. With a rose instead of a bullet, if you want to think of it that way. What’s left is habit and carbon paper. To think that Armstrong has just now gone to Buenos Aires for the first time and you can imagine the thousands of boobs who will think they’re listening to something great while Satchmo, with more tricks than an old fighter, bobbing and weaving, tired and amortized and without giving a damn what he does, strictly routine, while some of my friends whom I respect and who twenty years ago would cover their ears if you put on
Mahogany Hall Stomp
now pay God knows how much for an orchestra seat to listen to that warmed-over stuff. Of course, my country itself is warmed-over too, with all my patriotic love I’m forced to admit it.”
“Starting with you,” said Perico from behind a dictionary. “You’ve come here in the same mold as all of your countrymen who take off for Paris to get their ‘sentimental education.’ At least in Spain we learn all about that in brothels and at bullfights,
coño.
”
“And from the Countess Pardo Bazán,” said Oliveira, yawningagain. “Everything else you say is true, old boy. What I should really be doing is playing
truco
with Traveler. You didn’t know him, did you. You don’t know anything about all that. So what’s the use of talking about it?”
(– 115 )
14
HE came out of the corner he had been stuck in, he put one foot on a piece of floor after having examined it as if it had been vital to pick out the exact spot on which to place his foot, then he brought out the other one with the same caution, and six feet away from Ronald and Babs he began to shrivel down until he was impeccably installed on the floor.
“It’s raining,” said Wong, pointing at the skylight.
Wafting the smoke away with his hand, Oliveira looked at Wong with friendly contentment.
“It’s best to be at sea-level where all one can see are shoes and knees all around. Where’s your glass?”
“Over there,” said Wong.
It turned out that it was full and within reach. They began to drink, appreciatively, and Ronald put on a John Coltrane record which made Perico snort. Then a Sidney Bechet from his Paris
merengue
period, something that seemed to be making a little fun of Spanish prejudices.
“Is it true that you’re writing a book about tortures?”
“Not exactly,” said Wong.
“What is it, then?”
“In China one has a different conception of art.”
“I know, we’ve all read Mirbeau the Chinese. Is it true that you have photographs of tortures taken in Peking in 1920 or around that
“Ça alors,”
said Étienne.
“Yes, Armstrong’s great period,” said Ronald, examining the pile of records Babs had picked out. “Like Picasso’s giant period, if you like. Nowadays they’re both a pair of pigs. To think that doctors have invented ways to be rejuvenated … They’ll go on screwing us for another twenty years, wait and see.”
“Not us,” Étienne said. “We’ve already shot them down and just at the right moment, and all I ask is for someone to do the same for me when my time is up.”
“Just at the right moment? You’re not asking for much, kiddo,” said Oliveira, yawning. “But you’re right, we have given them the
coup de grâce
already. With a rose instead of a bullet, if you want to think of it that way. What’s left is habit and carbon paper. To think that Armstrong has just now gone to Buenos Aires for the first time and you can imagine the thousands of boobs who will think they’re listening to something great while Satchmo, with more tricks than an old fighter, bobbing and weaving, tired and amortized and without giving a damn what he does, strictly routine, while some of my friends whom I respect and who twenty years ago would cover their ears if you put on
Mahogany Hall Stomp
now pay God knows how much for an orchestra seat to listen to that warmed-over stuff. Of course, my country itself is warmed-over too, with all my patriotic love I’m forced to admit it.”
“Starting with you,” said Perico from behind a dictionary. “You’ve come here in the same mold as all of your countrymen who take off for Paris to get their ‘sentimental education.’ At least in Spain we learn all about that in brothels and at bullfights,
coño.
”
“And from the Countess Pardo Bazán,” said Oliveira, yawningagain. “Everything else you say is true, old boy. What I should really be doing is playing
truco
with Traveler. You didn’t know him, did you. You don’t know anything about all that. So what’s the use of talking about it?”
(– 115 )
14
HE came out of the corner he had been stuck in, he put one foot on a piece of floor after having examined it as if it had been vital to pick out the exact spot on which to place his foot, then he brought out the other one with the same caution, and six feet away from Ronald and Babs he began to shrivel down until he was impeccably installed on the floor.
“It’s raining,” said Wong, pointing at the skylight.
Wafting the smoke away with his hand, Oliveira looked at Wong with friendly contentment.
“It’s best to be at sea-level where all one can see are shoes and knees all around. Where’s your glass?”
“Over there,” said Wong.
It turned out that it was full and within reach. They began to drink, appreciatively, and Ronald put on a John Coltrane record which made Perico snort. Then a Sidney Bechet from his Paris
merengue
period, something that seemed to be making a little fun of Spanish prejudices.
“Is it true that you’re writing a book about tortures?”
“Not exactly,” said Wong.
“What is it, then?”
“In China one has a different conception of art.”
“I know, we’ve all read Mirbeau the Chinese. Is it true that you have photographs of tortures taken in Peking in 1920 or around that
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